Thursday 19 January 2017

Production peaking at a remarkably stable 50GW


Peak production over the last week has been bumping along as if there were an upper cap of 50 GW. Is this a chance event, or has the National Grid been leaning on big consumers?
The 3-8pm peak remains, though, but at an agreeably lower level of 5GW above daytime consumption. Hooray! Any comments on how much this is by accident and how much by design?

Thursday 12 January 2017

Peak demand lower at 50GW, but 7GW rise remains

UK National Grid Production at 0930 on Thursday 12th January 2017.

Demand peaked at 50.2 GW on 5th January 2017, an encouragingly low level. Total average demand continues to trend down thanks to energy efficiency, LED's etc.
But the peak of 7GW in the early evening remains - we are better at efficiency than we are at demand side response.
But DSR is easier to achieve once we have sufficient awareness of its low cost and high value.
So keep time-shifting and keep telling your friends!

Tuesday 3 January 2017

Green Energy Introduces a Domestic Time-of-Use Tariff

Green Energy Domestic Time-of-Use tariff 1st Jan 2017.
On New Year's Day, Green Energy announced the first 3 price domestic time of use tariff in UK .

Costs are:

Peak       24.99p   16:00-19:00 weekdays

Off Peak  4.99p    23:00-06:00 every night

Normal   11.99p  at all other times

I currently pay 17.6p normal and 5p off peak, on Ecotricity's new Energy Plus tariff. I calculate that ignoring the off peak I would need to use less than 43% of my electricity at peak times to make it worth changing. Unfortunately I am outside the radio range required by smart meters, so I can't switch.

As a fully signed up geek, I am happy to do this calculation, and to measure my hourly consumption using an Owl USB meter.
I wonder how many of us are willing or able to do that?
The simplest thing to do is to use less electricity at peak times, whatever the tariff you are on!